Asbury youth can ‘go for the gold’ with new employment program
Young adults can be certified for job placement
A new youth employment program seeks to give Asbury kids ages 16 through 21 a leg up.
The Go for the Gold initiative is taking root in Asbury Park as part of the city’s community development initiative, which is chaired by Mayor Ed Johnson and Assistant Prosecutor Thomas Huth.
Dan Passarella, the planning coordinator of the county’s workforce investment board in Eatontown, detailed it to the city council at last Wednesday’s meeting in city hall.
“Our mission is to work with employers and the customer – the job seeker,” Passarella said. “In [employers’] hearts, they really want to hire young people from Asbury Park but they have had some problems. Their main objective is to meet the needs of their company and their goals.”
Through Go for the Gold, young people from Asbury Park will complete a program and at the end, they will hold a certificate saying they are capable of retaining employment.
“One goal of the project is to satisfy the needs of the employer, to have them have the confidence that those people who we send through this program will be qualified workers,” Passarella said.
The program has several requirements of potential workers. Organizers held a focus group to devise criteria for the employees, talking to restaurant- and manufacturing-based employers about their qualifications for workers.
The first step toward Gold Certification is the completion of work readiness course that is standardized nationally, Passarella said. The workforce investment board has adopted the course, and will fund the cost of that course to eligible workers.
The course talks about how to deal with conflict; being on time; and other expectations.
Program organizers are also ensuring participants have 95-percent or higher attendance in the program and that they are in good standing — not failing or displaying bad behavior.
They will also require a letter of recommendation from each person looking to enter the program.
The council later passed a resolution endorsing the program.
“I think this is a great program,” Mayor Ed Johnson said. “It’s key to our overall efforts with the community development initiative.”
Future community development initiative projects include focusing on 14-to-16-year-olds; job readiness internships; family empowerment workshops and more.
